Decrescendo
by HC0
Summary: Some secrets cannot be contained...Kayverse


**Disclaimer: Erik is only mine in my fantasies. He and the rest of the fandom are the creation and property of Gaston Leroux/Andrew Lloyd Webber/Susan Kay. **

* * *

"Is Charles de Chagny here?" asked the voice on the other end of the phone.

"That's me," I replied. "Who is this?"

"I am Mr. Utterson. Your father's lawyer. I'm very sorry to tell you this, sir, but your father died last night." His voice reeked of false grief.

"What?" I felt like I'd been punched in the gut. "How?"

Utterson sighed. "As far as we know, it was a stroke. We'll be needing you, sir. Your father's will, and so forth—"

"Yes," I interrupted. "Yes, I know. Of course. I'll leave tonight."

"Thank you, Mr. de Chagny. And let me express my grief once again. Goodbye." He hung up.

I sat down heavily and tried to absorb what Utterson had just told me so casually: My father was dead. When my mother died it wasn't as big of a shock—she had been sick for so long. But this was so sudden…

Numbly, I picked the phone back up and rang the concert hall where I was to have performed the following night to tell them I had to cancel. Thank goodness, the manager was reasonable once I told him why—I don't think I could have taken any arguing.

As I put the phone back on its hook, Lucy came down the stairs. She started as she saw my face. "Charles? What's wrong?"

"My father died last night."

She sucked in her breath. "_Oh_. What happened?"

"He had a stroke." I ran a hand through my hair. "Is Eric asleep yet?"

"Yes. You know how it is with him."

I smiled weakly. Our son was the typical four-year-old when it came to bedtimes. "I'll go up now. I want to tell him goodnight before I go."

Lucy nodded.

Eric was wide awake when I came in, sitting up in bed playing with his toys. He started guiltily when he saw me and tried unsuccessfully to dive back under the covers.

"Eric, staying in bed also means going to sleep," I said as I untangled him.

"I'm sorry." He looked up at me earnestly. Although he'd been named for Lucy's father, he looked almost exactly like me. "Will you tell?"

"Not if you go right to sleep tonight. Eric, I have to go away, but I'll be back in a few days."

"Where are you going?"

"I'm going to London."

He seemed satisfied. "Goodnight."

"Goodnight." I kissed him and left for my bedroom to pack.

* * *

I pulled up in front of the house early the next morning, just as the sun was rising. It seemed like any ordinary day.

But then, so had yesterday. But yesterday I'd still thought I had a father.

As I neared the door, I realized that I had no way of getting in without a key. I lifted my hand and knocked.

A few seconds later, the door was opened by Peter Cribbins, a neighbor and close friend of my parents. "Charles," he said as I stepped inside. "I'm so sorry."

I nodded; I knew from experience that I simply had to learn to put up with well-meaning but still lacking of meaning platitudes. "Where is my father's body?"

"Upstairs, in the spare bedroom," he replied. "You can go up. I'll ring Mr. Utterson and tell him you've arrived."

"You do that."

Bodies always seemed so much smaller without their souls, I reflected vaguely as I entered the room where my father's body lay.

Gently, I pulled back the sheet that was covering him, and looked down at his face.

Ever since my mother died, my father had looked perpetually near the point of death, and it was only now that he finally looked at peace.

For some reason, even as the band of grief around my chest clenched ever tighter, I was unable to cry. I simply stood over my father's body, saying goodbye.

At length, I heard the door opening downstairs, and voices, and knew Mr. Utterson must have arrived. I softly replaced the sheet and went down.

Utterson was short and rather thin, with tufty gray hair. "Ah," he said as I came into the room. "You're Charles."

"Mr. Utterson, I presume?"

He shook my hand. "Yes. So sad, so sad. Well, sir, there's very little to be discussed in relation to inheritances. Your father left you everything he had. He also instructed me to give you this." Utterson gave me a small envelope.

Opening it, I found a key and a note:

_This is for the drawer in my room. I hope you will forgive me._

Forgive him? For what?

I pocketed note and key. "I'm going upstairs," I said to the men.

They nodded.

I knew the drawer my father was talking about: a small locked drawer in his bedside table that had been the subject of my endless curiosity when I was young. I used to beg him to tell me what was in it.

And now, at the age of thirty, I was finally going to find out.

I opened the drawer and pulled out a small hinged double picture frame. Opening it, I found a pair of faded line portraits both familiar and unfamiliar—one was my mother, but her face had never had that hardness to it. The other—the other was almost exactly me; the slight differences were hardly noticeable.

In growing confusion, I searched the rest of the drawer, and extracted an envelope. The paper inside looked fairly new—it had to have been written recently.

_Dear Charles—_

_I always meant to take my secret to the grave, but I have realized that you have every right to know. But first I must tell you a brief story. You see, while you have heard how your mother and I met as children, and then again at the Opera, you have heard almost nothing of Erik._

_I told you a little of him when we went to France—that he built the Palais Garnier; that he was a genius in magic, music, science. But other than that, nothing, and certainly not the most important information about him._

_When I first came to the Opera, at the age of twenty-one, I met Christine again. Eventually, I found out that she was receiving singing lessons from a mysterious man called Erik._

_The events that followed could fill books with their color and strangeness, but there is nod need for that. Indeed, perhaps it is better for the Phantom to remain a legend… _

_Almost from the moment they met, Erik loved your mother, and eventually she grew to love him back— far more, I believe, than she loved me, and they were married. But it was a brief marriage, for Erik died extremely soon after. Your mother and I married a month later, and then moved to England, where you were born._

_And you were born far too early for you to have been my child._

_It became increasingly obvious to me as you grew. Your talent for music, for example. I can say without any doubt that Erik was the greatest musician that ever lived. I am reasonably sure that the portraits in the picture frame are of Erik's parents, and while I cannot explain the resemblance of Erik's mother to Christine, you yourself can see how much you resemble your grandfather._

_And you can also see why I was so surprised, initially, at the name you gave to your son—the name of his true grandfather. Or his _other _grandfather, perhaps. Although Erik was your father biologically, I hope you will also consider me your father, for I certainly consider you my son—the best son I could ever have wished for._

_I don't know how you'll react to reading this, so I don't know if I can sign this as your father. So I will only say that I love you, and end this here._

Clutching the letter in my hand, I sat immobile for long minutes amidst the shattered remnants of my reality.

He wasn't my father. The parent I had loved for so many years; that I was mourning for now…was not. My real father was Erik, somebody who'd died before I was born.

Or was he?

Or wasn't he?

Raoul or Erik?

Raoul was the one I still thought of as my father, the one who'd known full well that I was the child of another man, but ignored the fact and loved me as though I was his own son. Erik had given me my music—one of the greatest loves in my life.

_Who? _

And then a thought—with blinding clarity: why does it have to be one?

So it was for _both_ my fathers that I finally wept.

THE END


End file.
